Justin Bieber Joins Instagram, World Explodes

With an unfathomable 11 million+ followers on Twitter, it’s no secret that Justin Bieber is already the Pied Piper for tweenish girls across the world. For perspective, that’s about as many followers as the entire population of Cuba. Suffice it to say: Wherever he goes, they follow in droves.

So it’s completely understandable that Instagram user-ship would explode when the Biebz tweeted out his first photo using the popular iPhone photo sharing app, which he sent out late Thursday night. TechCrunch is reporting that Bieber’s inaugural photo of L.A. traffic put a strain on the company’s servers, which saw the superstar gaining an unprecedented 50 new followers per minute.

Instagram has been steadily gaining in popularity, and just last month tipped over 5 million users, yet it still hasn’t assimilated into the mainstream quite like Twitter has. But in terms of celebrities, Bieber is somewhat of an early adopter (Snoop was the first to join the service), and he’s without question the biggest star to begin using Instagram. It’s a coup for the small San Francisco-based company, and may just be the tipping point that’ll take Instagram to the next level.

Perhaps user “itsmyworld” says it best in their starry-eyed comment for the teen idol: “Only one picture almost 800 likes and 5000 Followers! Bro, u got SWAG.”